Original publication details: Klosterman, Richard E. 1985. “Arguments for and against
planning”. In Town Planning Review, 56 (1), 5–20. Used with permission from Liverpool University Press.
1. See, for example, Mannheim, Karl, Man and Society in an Age of Reconstruction: Studies in Modern Social Structure, New York, Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1944, pp. 41–75;
Tugwell, Rexford G., ‘Implementing the General Interest’, Public Administration Review, 1 (1) Autumn 1940, pp. 32–49; Wootton, Barbara, Freedom Under Planning, Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 1945; Hayek, Friedrich A., The Road to Serfdom, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1944; and von Mises, Ludwig, Planning for Freedom and Other Essays, South Holland, Illinois, Libertarian Press, 1952.
2. Examples here include Schonfield, Andrew, Modern Capitalism, New York, Oxford University Press, 1965; and Dahl, Robert A. and Lindblom, Charles E., Politics,
Economics, and Welfare, New York, Harper and Row, 1953. The quotation is from Dahl and Lindblom, p. 5.
3. For recent critiques of planning see Friedman, Milton and Friedman, Rose, Free to Choose:
A Personal Statement, New York, Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich, 1979; Simon, William E., A Time for Truth, New York, Reader’s Digest Press, 1978; and Wildavsky, Aaron, ‘If Planning is Everything, Maybe It’s Nothing,’ Policy Sciences, 4 (3) June 1973, pp. 277–95.
4. The dramatically declining enrolments in American planning schools are documented and
analysed by Krueckeberg. Donald A., ‘Planning and the New Depression in the Social Sciences’, Journal of Planning Education and Research, 3 (2) Winter 1984, pp. 78–86.
5. Friedmann, John, ‘Planning as a Vocation’, Plan (Canada), 6 (2) April 1966, pp. 99–124 and 7 (3) July 1966, pp. 8–26.
6. A similar definition of planning is proposed by Alexander, Ernest R., ‘If Planning Isn’t
Everything, Maybe It’s Something’, Town Planning Review, 52 (2) April 1981, pp. 131–42.
7. Mannheim, op. cit.
8. These writers are ‘classical’ liberals in that their views of government and liberty are fundamentally different from those associated with contemporary liberalism. Classical liberals define liberty in the negative sense in which freedom is determined by the extent to which individuals’ actions are externally constrained by the actions of others; the wider the sphere of non-interference, the greater an individual’s liberty. Thus to increase the
(negative) liberty of individuals by decreasing the external interference of the state,
classical liberals call for a sharply reduced role for government in the domestic and foreign economy. ‘Contemporary’ liberals, on the other hand, view liberty largely in the positive sense in which individuals are free when no internal constraints such as a lack of
knowledge, resources, or opportunities restrain their actions. From this perspective, increasing the (positive) liberty of individuals, particularly the most deprived, requires deliberate government action to promote social welfare and reduce the internal constraints on individual action, even though this may restrain the actions (and negative liberty) of some individuals. Compare Friedman, Milton, Capitalism and Freedom, Chicago,
University of Chicago Press, 1962, pp. 5–6; and Finer, Herman, Road to Reaction, Boston, Little Brown and Co., 1945, pp. 221–8. Contemporary examples of the classical liberal argument include Hayek, op. cit., Friedman and Friedman, op. cit., Friedman, op. cit. and Sorensen, Anthony D. and Day, Richard A., ‘Libertarian Planning’, Town Planning Review, 52 (4) October 1981, pp. 390–402.
9. Heilbroner, Robert L., The Worldly Philosophers, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1969 (3rd edn), pp. 48–61; Friedman and Friedman, op. cit., pp. 9–27.
10. See, for example, Bator, Francis M., ‘The Simple Analytics of Welfare Maximization’, American Economic Review, 47 (1) March 1957, pp. 22–59.
11. Seventeen more restrictive assumptions including perfectly divisible capital and consumer goods and an absence of risk and uncertainty are identified by De. V. Graaff, J., Theoretical Welfare Economics, London, Cambridge University Press, 1957.
12. For analyses of the many empirical limitations of real markets see Lindblom, Charles E., Politics and Markets: The World’s Politics-Economic Systems, New York, Basic Books, 1977, pp. 76–89 and 144–57; and Heilbroner, Robert L. and Thurow, Lester C., The Economic Problem, Englewood Cliffs, Prentice Hall, 1978 (5th edn), pp. 201–19.
13. Cohen, Stephen, Modern Capitalist Planning: The French Model, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1969; Foster, Christopher, ‘Planning and the Market’, in Cowan, Peter (ed.), The Future of Planning: A Study Sponsored by the Centre for Environmental Studies, London, Heinemann, 1973, pp. 135–40; Meyerson, Martin, ‘Building the Middle- range Bridge for Comprehensive Planning’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 22 (1) 1956, pp. 58–64; and Skjei, Stephen S., ‘Urban Problems and the Theoretical
Justification of Urban Planning’, Urban Affairs Quarterly, 11 (3) March 1976, pp. 323–44.
14. Thus, for example, Adam Smith recognised that government must be responsible for: (i)
‘protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent societies’; (ii)
‘establishing an exact administration of justice’; and (iii) ‘erecting and maintaining those public institutions and those public works, which … are … of such a nature that the profit could never repay the expense of an individual or small number of individuals’, Smith, Adam, An Enquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (edited by Edwin Cannon), New York, Modern Library, 1937, pp. 653, 669, and 681; his third category of justified state functions is discussed in pages 681–740. Other government functions recommended by the classical economists include: the regulation of public utilities, the establishment of social insurance systems, the enactment of protective labour legislation, and compensatory fiscal and monetary policy. See Robbins, Lionel, The Theory of
Economic Policy in English Classical Political Economy, London, Macmillan, 1952, esp.
pp. 55–61.
15. The literature on public goods is extensive. For excellent reviews see Burkhead, Jesse and Miner, Jerry, Public Expenditure, Chicago, Aldine, 1971; and Head, John G., Public
Goods and Public Welfare, Durham, North Carolina, Duke University Press, 1974, pp. 68–
92 and 164–83. In the planning literature see Moore, Terry. ‘Why Allow Planners to do What They Do? A Justification from Economic Theory’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 44 (4) October 1978, pp. 387–98. The discussion below generally follows that in Bator, Francis M., The Question of Government Spending: Public Needs and Private Wants, New York, Collier Books, 1960, pp. 80–102.
16. Bator, op. cit., p. 104; Friedman and Friedman, op. cit., pp. 27–37. Similar arguments can be used to justify government provision of highways, dams, and other ‘decreasing cost’
goods with large initial costs and decreasing marginal costs; see Bator, op. cit., pp. 93–5.
17. The relevant literature here is extensive as well. For excellent reviews: Mishan, E. J., ‘The Postwar Literature on Externalities: An Interpretive Review’, Journal of Economic
Literature, 9 (1) March 1971, pp. 1–28, and Head, op. cit., pp. 184–213. In the planning literature see Lee, Douglas B. Jr, ‘Land Use Planning as a Response to Market Failure’ in de Neufville, Judith I., (ed.), The Land Use Planning Debate in the United States, New York, Pleneum Press, 1981, pp. 153–4.
18. This example is adapted from Davis, Otto A., and Whinston, Andrew B., ‘The Economics of Urban Renewal’, Law and Contemporary Problems, 26 (2) Winter 1961, pp. 106–17.
19. See the classic article by Garret Hardin, ‘The Tragedy of the Commons’, Science, 162, 13 December 1968, pp. 242–8. For more general discussions see Luce, Duncan and Raiffa, Howard, Games and Decision: Introduction and Critical Survey, New York, John Wiley, 1957, pp. 88–154. In the planning literature see Moore, op. cit.
20. Bator, op. cit., pp. 87–9; Musgrave, Richard S., The Theory of Public Finance: A Study in Public Economy, New York, McGraw Hill, pp. 17–22. These points do not, of course, exhaust the economic arguments for and against planning. Thus while Friedman, op. cit., pp.
7–21, and Hayek, op. cit., pp. 43–118, defend unrestricted markets as necessary to protect individual liberty, Barbara Wootton, op. cit., argues that government planning is fully compatible with the whole range of cultural, civil, political, and economic freedoms. For other economic arguments for planning see Webber, Melvin, ‘Planning in an Environment of Change, Part Two: Permissive Planning’, Town Planning Review, 39 (4) January 1969, pp.
282–4; Oxley, op. cit.; and Lee, op. cit. More fundamental ‘Marxist’ critiques of reliance on competitive markets are considered below.
21. See Webber, op. cit., pp. 284–95; Lee, op. cit., pp. 158–64; Friedman, op. cit., pp. 84–107;
Moore, op. cit., pp. 393–6; and Foster, op. cit., pp. 153–65.
22. See, for example, Becker, Gary S., ‘Competition and Democracy’, Journal of Law and Economics, 1, October 1958, pp. 105–9 and Wolf, Charles Jr., ‘A Theory of Nonmarket Failure: Framework for Implementation Analysis’, Journal of Law and Economics. 22 (1) April 1979, pp. 107–40.
23. See, for example, Lindblom, Charles E., ‘The Science of Muddling Through’, Public Administration Review, 19 (1) January 1959, pp. 79–88 and Wildavsky, op. cit.
24. Conolly, William E. (ed.), The Bias of Pluralism, New York, Atherton, 1969, pp. 3–13.
25. Lindblom, op. cit., pp. 170–233; Elkin, Stephen L., ‘Market and Politics in Liberal Democracy’, Ethics, 92 (4) July 1982, pp. 720–32; Miliband, Ralph, The State in Capitalist Society, New York, Basic Books, 1969.
26. Gamson, William A., ‘Stable Underrepresentation in American Society’, American Behavioral Scientist, 12 (1) November/December 1968, pp. 15–21; Skjei, Stephen S.,
‘Urban Systems Advocacy’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 38 (1) January 1972, pp. 11–24; also see Dye, Thomas R. and Zeigler, L. Harmon, The Irony of
Democracy: An Uncommon Introduction to American Politics, North Scituate, Mass., Duxbury Press, 1975 (3rd edn), pp. 225–84.
27. Olson, Mancur, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1965; Lowi, Theodore J., ‘The Public Philosophy:
Interest-group Liberalism’, American Political Science Review, 61 (1) March 1967, pp. 5–
24. For an extensive discussion of other forms of ‘non-market failure’ see Wolf, op. cit.
28. See, for example, Rondinelli, Dennis A., ‘Adjunctive Planning and Urban Policy
Development’, Urban Affairs Quarterly, 6 (1) September 1971, pp. 13–39; and Skjei, Stephen S., ‘Urban Problems and the Theoretical Justification of Planning’, Urban Affairs Quarterly, 11 (3) March 1976, pp. 323–44.
29. Davidoff, Paul, ‘Advocacy and Pluralism in Planning’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 31 (6) November 1965, pp. 331–8.
30. Krumholz, Norman, Cogger, Janice and Linner, John, ‘The Cleveland Policy Planning Report’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 41 (3) September 1975, pp. 298–
304; Krumholz, Norman, ‘A Retrospective View of Equity Planning: Cleveland, 1969–
1979’, Journal of the American Planning Association, 48 (2) Spring 1982, pp. 163–74.
31. Peattie, Lisa R., ‘Reflections on Advocacy Planning’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 34 (2) March 1968, pp. 80–8; Skjei, Stephen S., ‘Urban Systems Advocacy’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 38 (1) January 1972, pp. 11–24; Mazziotti, Donald F., ‘The Underlying Assumptions of Advocacy Planning: Pluralism and Reform’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 40 (1) January 1974, pp. 38, 40–7.
32. Klosterman, Richard E., ‘A Public Interest Criterion’, Journal of the American Planning Association, 46 (3) July 1980, p. 330; Barry, Brian, Political Argument, New York,
Humanities Press, 1965. pp. 234–5.
33. For examples of each argument see: (i) Robinson, Charles Mulford, City Planning, New York, G. P. Putnams, 1916, pp. 291–303 (the quotation is from p. 291); (ii) Howard, John T., ‘In Defense of Planning Commissions’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 17 (1) Spring 1951, pp. 89–93, and Tugwell, op. cit.; and (iii) Bettman, Alfred, City and Regional Planning Papers (edited by Arthur C. Comey), Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, pp. 5–30, and Dunham, Allison, ‘A Legal and Economic Basis for City Planning’, Columbia Law Review, 58, 1958, pp. 650–71.
34. The earliest example of this concern in the planning literature known to the author is Webber, Melvin M., ‘Comprehensive Planning and Social Responsibility: Toward an AIP Consensus on the Profession’s Role and Purposes’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 29 (4) November 1963, pp. 232–41.
35. For examples of these now-familiar critiques see Gans, Herbert J., ‘City Planning in America: A Sociological Analysis’ in Gans, Herbert J., People and Plans: Essays on Urban Problems and Solutions, New York, Basic Books, 1963; Altshuler, Alan A., ‘The Goals of Comprehensive Planning’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 31 (5) August 1965, pp. 186–95; Bolan, Richard S., ‘Emerging Views of Planning’, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 33 (4) July 1967, pp. 233–46; and Kravitz, Alan S.,
‘Mandaranism: Planning as Handmaiden to Conservative Politics’ in Beyle Thad L., and Lathrop George T. (eds), Planning and Politics: Uneasy Partnership, New York, Odyssey Press, 1970.
36. Critiques of the ‘rational’ planning model have dominated the planning theory literature for
the last decade. For reviews of this literature and their implications for contemporary planning practice see DiMento, Joseph F., The Consistency Doctrine and the Limits of Planning, Cambridge, Mass., Oelgeschlager, Gunn, and Hain, 1980, pp. 44–117; and Alexander, Ernest R., ‘After Rationality, What? A Review of Responses to Paradigm Breakdown’, Journal of the American Planning Association, 50 (1) Winter 1984, pp. 62–
9.
37. Examples here include Castells, Manuel, The Urban Question: A Marxist Approach, Cambridge, Mass., The MIT Press, 1977; Harvey, David, Social Justice and the City, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973, pp. 195–238; Paris, Chris (ed.), Critical Readings in Planning Theory, Oxford, Pergamon, 1982; and the articles cited in footnote 39 below.
38. Harrington, Michael, Socialism, New York, Saturday Review Press, 1972, pp. 270–307;
Baran, Paul A., The Longer View: Essays Toward a Critique of Political Economy, New York, Monthly Review Press, 1969, pp. 144–9; Huberman, Leo and Sweezy, Paul M., Introduction to Socialism, New York, Monthly Review Press, 1968, pp. 60–5.
39. See, for example, Fainstein, Norman I. and Fainstein, Susan S., ‘New Debates in Urban Planning: The Impact of Marxist Theory Within the United States’, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 3 (3) September 1979, pp. 381–403; Beauregard, Robert A., ‘Planning in an Advanced Capitalist State’ in Burchell, Robert W. and Sternlieb, George (eds), Planning Theory in the 1980s: A Search for New Directions, New Brunswick, NJ, Center for Urban Policy Research, 1978; Harvey, David, ‘On Planning the Ideology of Planning’ in ibid.; Boyer, M. Christine, Dreaming the Rational City: The Myth of City Planning, Cambridge, Mass., The MIT Press, 1983.
40. The discussion here draws heavily on that in Fainstein and Fainstein, op. cit.
41. Also see Branch, Melville C., ‘Delusions and Defusions of City Planning in the United States’, Management Science, 16 (12) August 1970, pp. 714–32, and Branch, Melville C.,
‘Sins of City Planners’, Public Administration Review, 42 (1) January/February 1982, pp.
1–5.
42. See Alexander, op. cit., pp. 138–40; Klosterman, op. cit.; Forester, John, ‘Critical Theory and Planning Practice’, Journal of the American Planning Association, 46 (3) July 1980, pp. 275–86; Clavel, Pierre, Forester, John and Goldsmith, William W. (eds), Urban and Regional Planning in an Age of Austerity, New York, Pergamon, 1980: and Dyckman, John W., ‘Reflections on Planning Practice in an Age of Reaction’, Journal of Planning
Education and Research, 3 (1) Summer 1983, pp. 5–12.